Entry / Exit / The Aesthetics of Ins and Outs

Most of us might not have considered entries and exit in a poetic context, but one way or the other, if we’re writing poetry, we’ve used them. 

The entry: opening line or sentence of the poem.

The exit: closing line or sentence of the poem. 

These two lines might feel simple or obvious, but they hold as much importance in a poem as a door holds in the purpose of a house. 

The entry is the doorway that invites the reader into the world of the poem, and when we begin to read, this line is offering a glimpse of what lies within. A strong opening line captivates the reader immediately, setting the tone, mood, and direction. It grips the reader’s attention, much like a hand extended in invitation, urging the reader to step further into the unfolding narrative, hinting at the poem’s purpose and the insights that will be revealed if one continues reading.      

On the other hand, the exit is the final note, the lingering echo. A powerful closing line seals the experience. It leaves the reader with something to hold onto—a sense of closure, or sometimes, the delicate absence of it. It’s a punctuation to the journey, a line that resonates, revisiting the essence of the poem even after the words have ended.

The body of a poem is our body, but the entry and exit of poems are birth and death. Everything we do with our exquisite little lives is the entire poem itself. We live, we love, we get exhausted, we speak up, we bottle up, we do everything, but to some extent the entirety of life rests in the subtle beginning of birth and the silence of our deaths—that way, the poem’s purpose should rest in how powerful the entry and exit lines or sentences are. 

Richard Hugo, in The Triggering Town: Lectures and Essays on Poetry and Writing spoke of the power of conformity. He writes, “… all music must conform to truth,” and, “all truth must conform to music.” To believe the first is to limit the writing of not just poems, but the power of the opening lines and exit lines of these poems. In believing the second, the lines must hold a sense of truth first, which must then conform to the universality of music.

Let’s look at this poem, written by Adesiyan Oluwapelumi and published by Outside the Box Poetry as our first example:      

 

Lightweight

The laziness of the knife

as it slices through beetroots and cauliflower;

how the blade, too, must become soft

to make love to a soft thing,

how lightweight the heavy burden of devotion.

The heat of the heart—mountain rock place

of the hefty issues—quenching

the cold weather of logic. O how

the weight grows numb;

I lug like Sisyphus this burden

more bearer.

                         

Oluwapelumi’s poem opens with “The laziness of the knife / as it slices through beetroots and cauliflower;” which resonates because it shows the juxtaposition of the sharp knife and the soft vegetable. This connects to the reader on a musical level considering the unexpected rhythm of “laziness” paired with multisyllabic “cauliflower,” adding a sonic element. The subtle nature of this line shows us the skill of the writer in creating tension in a small space. The tenderness focused on these competing concepts shows us Oluwapelumi’s devotion and compassion to language and his focus on poetry which engages his experiences. 

The beauty of an opening line or exit line doesn’t rest on the subject of the poem itself. Writing about love, social justice, or serious global issues doesn’t make the opening or closing line any more powerful; on the contrary, if a poem is about a serious plague of social problems, then the entry line might be even more impactful if it is light. There’s a sense of balance and empathy in the aforementioned poem. As we see in the example, if the poem is about the beauty of the mundane, these two important lines carry the burden of a serious subject. But these are just guidelines. The exciting part of poetry is that rules exist to be broken.      

We can see a similar technique in this poem by Franny Choi:

 

Celebrate Good Times   

The regime is having a birthday party, so we turn off the lights
and pretend we’re sick. All night, happy americans

honk their horns. We did it! they scream into our window.
In the morning, We is all over the floor. We sweep We

into a paper bag and label it EMERGENCY. The good news
is that things will go back to the way they were,

which is also the bad news. Meanwhile, I cut
an onion, and it’s onions all the way down, and that’s a fine

reason to cry at the sink on a Monday after the empire
congratulates itself on persisting again. No, thank you,

I’m stuffed, I couldn’t possibly have more hope. I haven’t finished
mourning the last tyrant yet. I haven’t said enough

goodbyes to—oh, what was her name? And hers?
How many We’s did they cut out of me? And whose country

was I standing on, the last time we survived?

 

The poem’s opening line sets a defiant tone, effectively contrasting public euphoria with private despair. Choi’s use of “We” as both a literal and symbolic element illustrates the fragmentation of collective identity and its impact on the individual. The image of sweeping “We” into a paper bag labeled “EMERGENCY” emphasizes the futility and urgency of managing collective trauma and loss. The metaphor of the onion, “onions all the way down,” powerfully conveys layers of grief and ongoing struggle, adding depth to the personal experience of mourning. Choi’s craft is notable for its ability to interlink personal and political spheres, using vivid imagery and emotional touchstones to evoke a sense of continuous, unresolved conflict.

In both examples, the poets use their cultural contexts—Oluwapelumi’s reflection on personal and mythological burdens clearly mirrors his African background (Nigeria to be precise), and Choi’s critique of history and identity references her Korean-American identity. Both of these personal points of view shape how these poets construct their poems’ entry and exit points in ways that can be traced to these legacies and often quite intimate histories. Our places of origin, or where we live, affect not just the opening and exit lines of our poems, but also the kind of themes we explore. A poet from a place of conflict might use stark contrast and urgent imagery to depict their despair, yearnings and resilience, while a poet from a place of tranquility might open or end a poem in a more restrained way. The sensory languages depicted in poems can be a subconscious manifestation of the kind of life the poet is living. The first and last lines, however, remain the most telling, as they are the most intuitive points of engagement. Even though we’re advised to separate the writer from the work, oftentimes the writer becomes their art. Or is it the other way around? 

In contrast to the scientific notion that magnets with like charges will repel each other, poetry thrives on a different law. A striking entry line can draw in an equally intense exit line, as seen in Eniola Abdulroqeeb Arówólò’s poem “Quest.” His entry, “The soil once vegetated by luscious ferns / Is now riddled with summer heat & dry stumps,” and his closing, “Death is as evident as birth… Lighten the yoke. / Rid my garden of anxieties,” reveal that poetry does not need the exit to settle the chaos of the entry. Instead, the final line often releases the poem’s burdens, defying the need for a neat closure. 

To fully understand the role of exits in poetry, it’s important to recognize that the conclusion of a poem is not just a resolution, but a moment of release. While scientific principles follow predictable laws, poetry operates on its own kind of magnetic pull, where the interplay of the opening and closing lines forms a deep, emotional circuit. A poem doesn’t need to tie up its ideas neatly to leave a lasting impact. Instead, as readers, we are often left with a sense of transformation—a quiet but undeniable shift in perspective.

In certain works, such as Eniola Abdulroqeeb Arówólò’s “garden of anxieties,” the exit does not bring closure in the traditional sense. It doesn’t answer the chaos presented but rather releases it, leaving the reader forever marked by the journey. This sense of release, rather than resolution, is a hallmark of poetic exits that leave us yearning to enter and experience the poem’s world again. The entry and exit lines, like magnetic forces, shape the experience from start to finish, leaving us changed whether we can articulate it or not.

In contrast to the scientific notion that magnets with like charges will repel each other, we can see from previous examples that poetry thrives on a different law. A striking entry line can draw an equally striking exit. Poetry does not need to stop for Death—rather, it will stop on its own, for us. The poetic form does not rely on the exit to settle the chaos that sometimes takes place in a particularly turbulent, memorable poem—Eniola Abdulroqeeb Arówólò’s “garden of anxieties” comes to mind. Instead, the final line often releases the poem’s burden, allowing us as readers to exit without trouble, returning to the world forever changed, a shift impossible to articulate, ready to enter and exit again and again.